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kopi luwak

In this shot of caffeinated wisdom, Alun Evans explores what might just be the strangest phenomenon in global coffee consumption…
“For those of you who do not know what kopi luwak is, take a deep breath, put your cappuccino down and read on. Luwak is the Indonesian name for the Masked Palm Civet. This animal has close relatives throughout most of Asia, as well as in Ethiopia and Kenya. Its poor cousin in China got blamed for being a link in the SARS epidemic in 2004 and got pretty much wiped out in a government cull. Before that it had been a culinary delicacy in Mainland Chinese cuisine. In Indonesia, the range of the luwak is quite widespread. Their habitat includes higher altitude, less densely populated areas of Sumatra, Java, Bali, Sulawesi and the islands of Nusa Tenggara. The luwak is nocturnal by nature and is quite wary of human contact. It nearly always comes out at dusk to hunt for food and to forage, by morning it is tucked up sleeping…”